


in those days, your heart was light and nervous

by formerly_known_as___REDACTED



Category: Bloodline (TV 2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Drunken Kissing, Everyone Is Alive, F/M, Family Drama, Flirting, Mother-Daughter Relationship, My First Work in This Fandom, Not Canon Compliant, Post-Divorce, Present Tense, Reader-Insert, Travel, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Work In Progress
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-26
Updated: 2021-02-26
Packaged: 2021-03-17 07:07:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,956
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29467743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/formerly_known_as___REDACTED/pseuds/formerly_known_as___REDACTED
Summary: Your parents arrange for you and your teenage daughter to stay with them at Rayburn House for a family vacation and you decide, on a whim, to take a couple extra days prior to spend alone in Key West.It's your first time visiting the area, and your mother suggests that you to fly into Miami and make the long drive down---it's the best way to see the Keys for the first time---and a stop at a picturesque spot for lunch changes everything.
Relationships: Danny Rayburn/Reader, Danny Rayburn/You, Other Relationship Tags to Be Added
Comments: 2





	1. falling bridges

**Author's Note:**

> okay y'all this fic is _old_ and it's _long_...the original unfinished draft is like 50K so please be kind, it's taking a lot of polish to make this shit presentable

You’re not used to such light. 

At first, you hold yourself in. Tense your body against it. With the air conditioning off, the sun warms the air before it warms the upholstery; this light has weight, it covers you like the warmth of someone’s body, like breath, like skin. The heat of it touches the inside of your head, stirs your blood. Makes you dizzy.

You step out of your car, glance at your phone.

[the sperm donor] I could still put Freya on a plane, you know. That would get her to KW by noon tomorrow.

Here, an old bridge runs alongside the new one. It’s fallen, is falling still, in the kind of disrepair that is dangerous for cars but not for feet. A scattering of people stands on them, fishing lines dropping into the shallow blue water.

[Me] Why do you do this? I told her NO

You toss the phone onto the passenger seat, reach into the cooler.

A strong wind blows in off the water. The soda can feels hostile, ice-cold metal numbing your knuckles. The wind lifts your hair, fills your clothes with ocean scent. Humidity sheathes the can in sweat. The wet can slides in your fingers. Drops darken the white gravel.

[the sperm donor] She’s a good girl and a responsible girl. We raised her well.

You pocket the phone and shut the car door, leave the road behind. 

You follow the backbone of the point. The sky’s the blue of every place surrounded by ocean and it hesitates before meeting the distant sea, kisses it in a long restless line of pale turquoise. The constant wind drives thin wings of foam into the water’s surface. Your eyes find a long curve of white sand running beneath, stretching beneath a texture of blue-greens and patches of living coral distorted by the water’s restlessness.

A line of pelicans crosses the sky.

Loose crumbled stone crunches under your sandals. You pass through brush, thick green leaves gleaming in delicate lime hues, and step out onto a tumble of rocks. 

The white sandbar leads off into green shallows, forms the shifting shape of a woman lying on her side: a broad pale thigh curved into bended knee, the calf stretching out into blued distortion. Beyond that, asleep in the deeps, a narrow foot curls around patches of heavy green coral.

You think about giving your bare feet over to the water, imagine its kind temperature.

You sit at the water’s edge.

[Me] This has nothing to do with how responsible she is and SHE knows it and YOU know it

[Me] I told her NO and now you’re undermining my authority and while to you I know that’s just another fucking Tuesday I cannot get her to listen to me about anything if you’re always yanking the rug out

Your stomach rumbles and you unwrap your sandwich, take a bite.

[the sperm donor] Come on, she’s the perfect age for Key West. She’ll love it.

[Me] She’s not, actually, because she’s 17

You sigh and shake your head and make a face and lock the screen and stuff the phone back into your pocket. You take another bite.

You remember how after college, you’d gone to a party in Boston with Freya’s father and it ground away beneath you like a runaway machine and Kendra, long before becoming your sister-in-law, had ended up drunk in the bathtub; the two of you’d been on the roof, had crawled out through the guest bedroom window and sat looking at the stars. It was cold, you remember, and you’d both been wrapped up in a sleeping bag that smelled like mothballs, there was cat hair on it, the mosquitoes whined in your ears but the stars were soft and so gentle in the sky. A blessing. 

In those days, your heart was light and nervous.

 _That was a long fucking time ago_.

A shadow passes behind you, thin and flickering. The crunch of gravel makes you turn. 

The shadow comes from a tall lean man picking his way over the sharp and tumbled rocks. He’s dressed in beat-up khaki shorts, a wifebeater, a short-sleeved button-up blue shirt left open and his tanned freckled skin says that he might’ve been blond as a younger man, or perhaps a redhead, but these days it's a thick longish wavy mix of grays, silvers, a hint of coppery brass, threads of white. A broad-brimmed straw hat shades his long face. A pair of mirrored sunglasses cover his eyes. There’s a fishing pole balanced on one shoulder. 

“Hi.”

His feet slow. He takes off his sunglasses, comes to a complete stop. He grins. “Hey.”

You shade your eyes with the flat of your hand. “Nice day, isn’t it?”

“Sure is.” He nods and looks around; he’s got a husky, lazy voice that’s nasal in the higher ranges and gravel in the lower ones. His grin broadens, cuts deep dimples into lean cheeks. “Yeah.”

You smile, take a swig of soda. “You look like a local.”

“Guilty, I’m afraid.” He shrugs, jerks his chin in your direction. “Why?” He tilts his head. “You lost?”

You shake your head. “No.”

“Ah.” He chuckles, makes a spinning gesture with his free hand. “See, most times right after the whole ‘you a local’ thing comes the whole ‘I’m asking for directions’ thing? So…sorry about that, you’ll have to forgive me.” He shrugs. “I made an assumption.”

“It’s okay, no worries.” You grin, drop your hand. “Though I’d be careful with that, if I were you.”

“Oh?” He shifts his weight and a slight smile, crooked and fleeting, crinkles the corners of his eyes. “What’s that?”

Your heartbeat stirs out of its somnolence, quickens a little. “Assuming.”

“Because it makes an ass out of you and me? He glances at your lips. He looks in your eyes. “Uh huh, yeah.” He nods and looks away, laughing. “I’ve heard that one before.”

“Uh huh. Have a good one.” You nod at the water. “Good luck.”

“I think I will.” He replaces his sunglasses. “Thanks.” His smile broadens. “I sure hope it’s the same for you.”

The sun’s heat hides the flush in your cheeks. “Thanks.”

He touches the brim of the hat and nods and you nod back and catch yourself watching him walk the rest of the way to the sandbar—he’s got a loose spine and he leads with his hips, his feet have intimate knowledge of the ground—- your soda still in one hand, your sandwich still in the other. 

The sun glitters bright and vicious off the water.

The wind flutters in his clothes. He puts a hand on the crown of his hat.

You tuck the soda between your feet. You take a bite of your sandwich.

He glances over his shoulder and you cover your mouth with one hand long enough to swallow. He grins. You smile back, wave with your fingers. 

He braces his knees against the water, takes the pole off his shoulder. He holds it out from his body, releases the line; he casts, the motion turned loose in his shoulder, a smooth transfer of momentum sliding through his elbow. A quick flick, shimmering like heat lightning, curls up and out through the unspooling line.

You wipe your mouth, wrap up what’s left of your sandwich. “Hey!”

He turns, raises his voice over the steady roar of the wind. “Hey yourself!”

“Do you mind if I…” You rise onto uneven feet, dig a scrunchie out of your pocket. “May I…” You gather up your whipping hair. “May I come out there and stand with you?” You wrap it into a bun. “Do you mind?”

“Depends.”

“Oh?”

“Those, uh…sandals you got on.” He waves at your feet. "They waterproof?”

“Yeah, I…” You look down, shrug. “They’re sport sandals, so.” You nod. “I think so.”

“Cause this,” he calls out, moving one forearm in a wide circle, “it’s all reef here, and it’ll cut the shit right outta your feet.”

“I think these are okay.” You walk toward the sandbar and hold your arms out. “You wanna check and make sure?”

“Do they have those thick rubber soles on em?”

“They do.” You stick a foot out, toe the water’s edge.

“Then come on out, if you feel lucky.” He waves you toward him. “I think you’ll be okay, but be careful. It can be real shifty underfoot.”

You nod and step down, the cool water climbing your calves. You keep your arms out.

He watches you, that small smile flickering on his face. “How do you like it?” 

“I like it…” There’s nothing to cut the wind and it shoves into your bare skin. “It’s beautiful.”

“Is this your first time?”

“It is, yeah.” You nod, look around. “My parents come here all the time, they’d come here every year for their wedding anniversary while I was growing up.” You hug yourself. “My dad’s pretty into fishing, but this is my first time.”

“Good.”

“It’s…really beautiful, I’d seen pictures but.” You move into his shadow. “I don’t know anything about fishing.”

He smiles. “What a pity.”

“I guess it is.” You shrug and dip your fingers into the water, glance at him. “Am I bothering you?”

“Nope.” With a sideways sweep of the arm, he casts the line again. “Not even a little.”

The air tastes like salt. Heat and light fills your head, tightens in your face. The land seems far away.

“What’s your name?”

You hesitate.

“Because I’m Danny.” He keeps his attention on the water. “In case you were wondering.”

“Yeah.” You tell him your name. “I was, a little.”

“Good.” He chuckles. “Hey...” He crooks his finger, grins. He holds the handle of the pole out to you. “You wanna try?”

“Um…I have no idea how.”

“It’s easy.” Danny puts the pole in your hand, gathers up the line. “I’ll show you.”

“Are you sure?” You shake your head. “I mean, it’s—”

“Now the concept of this is that you wanna trick the fish into thinking your lure is a bug or something, you know.” He shrugs a shoulder. “Interesting to a fish. So the idea is to kinda flick the lure along the top of the water. To make it dance a little.”

“All right, but…I have to say.” You giggle. “That sounds hard.”

“Well, it kinda is. But it kinda isn’t. It takes practice to get good, yeah, but everything’s like that.”

He backs up, starts to move; you blink several times, look off toward the road. 

_Oh my god_. Your heart pounds. _He’s going to do the thing_.

“Is it all right if I…walk around here, get behind you? It might be easier if I kinda shadow your movements, but I don’t want you to feel like I’m being…” Danny chuckles. “You know.” He slides his voice into a drawl, makes it softer. “Improper towards you.”

“Hey, it’s uh…do what you gotta do.” He circles behind you and your stomach goes all fluttery. “Whatever’s easier. It’s fine. Really.”

“Kay, so…” His feet disturb the sand beside yours. “Put your hand…”

“All right.” Your breath shallows. “Here?”

“Yeah, that’s great. Now…” Danny reaches around your waist, keeps his body from touching yours. “Pick up the line with your other hand.”

“Now what?”

“Pull it in. Make loops…yeah, just like that. Good, good.” He glances at your profile, grins. “You sure you’ve never done this before?”

“I’m quite sure, and I’m a little afraid of looking like a horse’s ass.”

“Hey, there’s nothin wrong with that, I mean…everyone starts out as a beginner, right?”

“Yeah. Yeah.”

“Then don’t worry about it.” It comes out slow and soft, his tone soothing. “No one’s judging you.”

“Okay.”

“Now…the cast is the next part. That’s where you flip the pole back and send the line cruising out over the water. You ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.”

“Good.”

“Okay, so—”

“Listen to me.”

“I’m listening.”

“It’s like…think of it like…you’ve heard of cracking a whip, I mean a real whip, not that thing that looks like a long-handled paddle, a riding crop, but like…Indiana Jones type shit.”

You snort, start giggling.

“Nah I’m serious, like a whip, where the goal is to kinda…” He starts to laugh with you. “Make a wave go through it so that end snaps, I know, I know, I sound ridiculous. Go ahead. Laugh.”

“I’m sorry, Danny, I just…”

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up.” He chuckles. “My metaphor is stupid, I can accept that.”

You burst into manic laughter, smother your mouth with the back of one hand.

“As I was was saying—” Danny leans over, brings his voice to your ear: “Ahem, ma’am—-do you mind?” He chuckles. “Anyways, you kinda wanna do that, but…uh, without the snap.”

“Like…how?” You keep trying to rein the giggles back in but it doesn’t work. “What does that even mean?”

“So that instead of snapping it just…touches down on the water, here—” He closes his fingers over yours and rattles your forearm. “Loosen up that arm, okay? All right?” He lowers his voice. “I’ll do it for you, so you can feel it.” You hear the smile weave in and out of his breath. “Kay?”

“Yeah.” You bite your lip and nod; you start to turn your head and glance back at him but he’s too close. “Okay.” You nod again, faster this time. “Yeah.”

Danny’s hand encircles your wrist, encircles the pole; your chest lifts and your belly tightens. Your breath trembles. 

“Now…I need you to relax, this ain’t gonna work right if you don’t relax.” He brings his mouth close to your ear, keeps his voice low. “C’n you do that for me?”

“I’m trying to, I’m…” You wrestle your breath; the skin hovering at a constant cusp between water and air tingles. Goosebumps swarm the backs of your arms. You wrangle your exhale into something long and slow. “I’m trying.”

“I want you to take in a nice deep breath for me, okay?” A wisp of smoky gravel enters his voice. “Go…slow.”

You nod and open your mouth, pull in a deep double-lungful of salt-laden air. He waits for the lift in your chest to crest, pulls your arm back; with your shaky exhale he sends a flick of lazy forward motion down the length of the pole. Line unspools, the big flywheel humming. It billows out in a wide rolling arc across the water. 

You’re lightheaded, dizzy.

The fly touches the surface.

“You feel that?” Danny eases the loops out of your other hand. “That’s contact. It’s the fly hitting the water.”

“I think so?”

“It’s subtle, like a…twitch. Or a blink.”

“Uh…” You glance at his jerking fingers. “Is this the dancing part?”

Danny chuckles. “You might say that.”

“What do I do now?”

“Hold on.” He plays the line, a motion as subtle as a shiver. He chuckles. “You’ll know a bite if you feel one, trust me.”

“Okay.”

“Mind if I let you in on a little secret?”

“Uh.” You blush. “All right?”

“To be honest with you, I’m pretty indifferent to fishing.” He gathers the line, rewinds the reel. “On the other hand, though, I’m pretty into to fresh food.”

Your phone buzzes and you jump. 

“No matter where you go..." Danny shakes his head, takes the rod out of your hand. "There you are.”

“Yeah.” You reach across your body, pull your phone out of your pocket. You glance at the screen. You put it on silent. “And no matter where you go, your kid will still text you over something completely unimportant.”

“Uh huh.” He steps back, nods. “That sure is a thing, yeah.”

You stuff the phone back into your pocket. “You have kids?”

Danny glances over. “One.”

“Same.” You laugh and it’s strained. “One’s enough.”

“How old?”

“Seventeen.”

“Yeah...wow.” Danny’s laughing; he shakes his head. “Same here. A son. You?”

“Nope.” You put your hands in your back pockets. “Daughter.”

“I mean…is he a pain in my ass?” Danny shrugs a shoulder. “Yeah, sure. Course he is.” He watches the water. “Sometimes. He sure does make life interesting, though.”

“They do.” You turn, look up at him. “And thank you for that.”

His mirrored lenses reflect your face, distorted and painted with bright flashes of sun. “For what?”

“People always shit on teens, but teens can be so interesting and fun…my daughter is fun most of the time, we get along pretty well, and she’s got a wicked sense of humor.” You shrug. “It doesn’t stop them from having their moments, of course.”

“Yeah.” Danny laughs. “Amen.”

“I should…look I need to go, I have someplace to be, but...” You turn your back on the horizon. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it, I had fun.” He waves a hand. “It’s been my pleasure.”

“Maybe I’ll see you around?”

“Hey.” He shrugs. “You never know.” 

You push your way out of the water.

Danny calls out your name. “Hey!”

You turn.

“Enjoy it.” He touches the brim of his hat. “Your time here, I mean, cause all this…” He gestures in a circle. “It’s never the same twice.”


	2. the skull woman

Miami radio stations drop out, one at a time. 

You turn the stereo off.

When you left you had no idea there would be so many palms; they grow everywhere, tall, spreading their monstrous fronds, holding their pale coconuts up beneath them in precarious bunches. The light gray trunks curve back on themselves at the shore, pushed into wind-shapes, they dip low over the water. It’s like a postcard but for the lack of sand—key beaches are sparse, narrow, miserly.

You pass a green stucco hotel. It’s closed, the windows boarded up, its crushed coral drive full of weeds and the dream whispers to you as it has whispered to others: 

_You could leave your life behind. Be an innkeeper. It can’t be that hard_. 

You need to pee. You’re thirsty. Your legs ache from all this sitting. 

_You’d live on the property. You’ll get to know the island. It’ll get to know you. The tides will move into your blood. You’ll greet the winter refugees with their pale faces and their shorts in February and tell them where to fish and where to eat and what to do with their kids._

You see resorts hidden in the foliage. You see streets that disappear into banks of flowers. You pass a gas station with a vending machine but no bathrooms. The ocean breaks through the trees in bright patches. 

_After all_ , you think, glancing at the hotel as it recedes in your rearview, _someone built this place with their own two hands, someone carved this yard out of the wild trees. Someone layered love into those green walls_.

On an approaching corner is a tiny restaurant painted in macaw colors and you pull into the crushed shell lot and park next to the lime green door.

_You think you could be a local?_

You kill the engine and grab your purse off the passenger seat; you climb out of the car and your equilibrium flickers, your bones lulled into a false complacency by the long miles of constant motion. 

_What does that mean to you?_

The wind off the sea rushes down the street, soft and fragrant as the skin of a god; the skin on your shoulders tightens underneath the full burden of the sun. You pull the scrunchie out of your hair, re-gather it.  
You walk into the restaurant and the interior is dark. You take off your sunglasses. The air smells like tomatoes, onions, chilies, cilantro, corn and grease, cooking beef. The rustic tables all wear plastic cloths, unlit candles.

_What would you do if you lived here?_

A young server in a colorful dress greets you, offers a menu. She leads you to a corner table and you order a Pepsi with extra ice and lime wedge.

You take a sip. The shock of the cold hits your mouth, snaps you out of the heat’s lull.

_I guess it means the freedom to walk down the street at any time and put my feet in the water. To daydream about turning into a mermaid, about turning into something just as beautiful._

A painting hangs over the table opposite. You look at it; in it there’s a woman in a white dress and she’s in a chair, surrounded by a stained wood frame, holding a basket of rolls over her head; it’s tricky though, the space inside her bent arms forms the eye socket illusions of a skull. 

_Once you see it, though…look at that, your brain’s all in._

The ties of her headscarf become nostrils, the folds of her belted waist become upper teeth. The long hem of her dress drapes across her spread knees, folds itself into lower teeth.

You gesture to the server. 

“Ma’am?”

“Hey.” You smile at her. “Do you have any idea who painted this painting?”

She smiles back, shakes her head. “None, sorry.”

The woman in the painting sits in a bakery. Surrounded by baskets of bread, close inspection reveals loaves shaped like thighbones and Virgin Marys. Some of the baskets sit in piles of shadow and light, the loaves within them arranged to look like skulls. The canvas itself forms a warm space around her fashioned out of firelit tones.

You take another sip. Your drink is so cold that the ice hasn’t melted; it’s so cold going down your throat that you start to shiver.

_This woman, she’s a woman and a skull, she’s surrounded by bread but even the bread, her good nutritious bread, makes shapes of death._

You wonder what her name is, wondered if the artist ever named her, if they knew her, or if the skull woman was just Woman, a representation put forth, a composite of features coded feminine by culture. 

_What would be a good name for her?_

You study her face. She has no expression. The features are perfect, bland and smooth, white as a doll’s. 

_Does she know, then, that she’s a skull? Does she know that the loaves are made in the shapes of thighbones? When she looks at them, what does she see? Did she make them, or did her aunts make them, her mother, her sisters? Is the baker just a boss? Is this her job, is she there to sell them? Look at her bland face, her perfect expression. She’s so young with her big forearms grown thick and muscular from lugging baskets of bread to market every day._

You finish your soda, ask for another one.

_You look at something everyday and it starts to lose its shape. Does she see them anymore? A mischievous aunt could make loaves like breasts, like cocks, and perhaps she wouldn’t see them because all this girl sees is work. Her perfect expression. Her life, made from baskets of bread._

You order a plate of guacamole.

 _Perhaps you should’ve eaten your sandwich instead of leaving it out in the sun so long that you’re afraid of the mayonnaise_.

You think of the water, how close it is.

_Daydreaming about mermaids and unchanging beauty but that whole unchanging thing is just a mask, really—for is there anything more mercurial than the sea?_

It’s just through the walls and down that single narrow street—not even a walk, it’s more like a hop skip and a jump—-and you could be face to face with all that vast and smothering beauty.

 _You could be up to you knees in wet and daydreaming about handsome fishermen_.

You blush. You rub your face with both hands, breathe out through your fingers.

_Do they have those thick rubber soles on em?_

The skin up and down your legs still tingles with salt.

The server brings another soda, takes your empty glass—still rattling with loose bits of ice—-away.

The guacamole comes on a banana leaf, garnished with a fuchsia orchid, on a brightly painted blue plate with suns and moons whirling around the rim. There’s a lot of it; it’s smooth and creamy, tastes bright and fresh in a way that would never happen at home. The chips in the accompanying bright green basket are still hot.

“Ma’am?”

You look up. “Hi.”

“I asked the boss about the painting? She says that the artist, his name is Octavio Ocampo and that it’s in the metamorphosis style?”

“Oh wow, thank you…” You squint at her name tag. “Everly.” You look at her and smile. “I really appreciate it.”

“No problem.” She grins. “Can I get you anything else?”

“I don’t think so, not right now.”

“How about another soda?”

“That’d be great, thank you.”

You pick up the orchid, twirl it by the stem. You sniff it, play with the velvet petals.

The server—- _Everly_ , you think, _what a good name_ —-comes back with a fresh drink. She stoops a little on her way by, leaves it balanced at the table’s edge.

You haul your phone out of your pocket, unlock the screen.

[freygoblin] where u at

You pull the basket of chips closer, pluck out a chip. Scoop up bright green garlicky avocado mash.

[Me] Islamorada I think

[freygoblin] so u still on the road then

You eat.

[Me] yep

[freygoblin] k

[Me] your father lobbied for you unsuccessfully, I really hope you didn’t put him up to it

[freygoblin] he thinks ur being unfair

[Me] I’m sure he does

[freygoblin] i know u do & i don’t understand why u can’t just 

[freygoblin] listen to him sometimes

[Me] What goes on between your father and I is nothing you need to concern yourself with

[freygoblin] it affects me too mom so yea i do

[Me] Parents make the parenting decisions

[Me] Sorry kiddo but your input is not needed

You look at the skull woman sitting in her painting and think _maybe she wears makeup so she wouldn’t look so tired_. You imagine her, young and still soft, rising every morning in the dark to make the bread.

[freygoblin] i’ll be 18 in like 6 mos tho!

[Me] Only six months! Good thing that’s not a long wait!

[freygoblin] SIGH

[Me] I’ll call you when I get there…are you excited?

[freygoblin] way to change the subject mom

[Me] I’m changing it because this conversation is over

[freygoblin] also the place sounds boring

[freygoblin] at least key west has people instead of just fish

[Me] don’t be like that, there are people at the place

[freygoblin] yea boring old people who think fishing is a good time

[Me] How would you know if fishing’s a bad time

[Me] It’s not like you ever tried it

[freygoblin] haha yea why would I

[freygoblin] it sounds like a stupid waste of time

[Me] It’s not for people who are into fresh food

For the first time, you notice that this restaurant boasts an empty outdoor stage. It’s back-to a view of the water, the whole outdoor dining area shaded by a bright blue awning and framed by branches of white frangipani; you see tall shrubs of red hibiscus too, pots of gardenia, fuchsia bougainvillea fierce as a sunburn clambering up and over a whitewashed wooden fence. 

[freygoblin] but grampy doesn’t care about that

[freygoblin] he just likes to kill things

[freygoblin] if he ate them the whole thing would be less gross

[Me] Sigh

[freygoblin] he’s got 5 plastinated or whatever it is they do to those marlins so they can go up on the wall

[freygoblin] they all look the fuckin same

[freygoblin] with their creepy fish eyes

[freygoblin] DON’T U SIGH AT ME

The edges of the awning are strung with small star-shaped lanterns.

You pull the orchid apart, bruise the petals. You shred them. You sprinkle the bits all around your plate. 

_It looks nice_.

You imagine how it might look at night, the white tables brimfull with animated voices and the candles on the tables flickering in their thick amber glass holders, star lanterns twinkling and cutting white light into shadowed lace and servers darting around like fish, stage lights playing across a swaying crowd of sweating bodies—you’re not sure what kind of music might play in a place like this, and your mind switches back and forth between raucous cover bands and Spanish-guitar sensual—the heartbeat thrum of the music always loud enough to be heard by passing cars, the small crushed-shell parking lot always packed full.

_Like it could be fun._

You eat.

[freygoblin] IT’S MURDER FOR FUN & U KNOW IT

[Me] Please do not throw f-bombs around Nana because I will never hear the end of it

[freygoblin] why couldn’t u bring me with u to key west?

You glance at the painting, think the skull woman goes downstairs into the red kitchen with its terracotta tiles cool underfoot and in her haze of sleep she thinks of the Blessed Virgin and her hands make it so. 

[Me] Because you’re still in school and this is not a negotiation

[freygoblin] what about u tho?

[freygoblin] u can miss the last 3 days & i can’t?

[Me] I’m an adult with paid time off at her job

[freygoblin] i can miss 3 days! my grades are perfect! we’re not even doing anything!

[Me] It’s still not a negotiation, Freya

You eat the last of your guacamole.

You think _the skull woman dreams of her mother’s exhausted thighbones and her hands make it so. The loaves come out of the oven, hot. She carries them into the street_.

You sigh.


End file.
